The present invention relates generally to management and/or navigation of items arranged in a hierarchical structure and more particularly to methods for presenting items such as folders or directories that are arranged in a hierarchical structure in a computer system.
Computer systems generally store software program files and data files in folders or directories. The folders are typically arranged and maintained in a hierarchical structure or file system by an operating system or file manager to facilitate easy access and navigation by users of the computer system.
In certain operating systems such as Microsoft® Windows®, folders are displayed in a window using a tree-type structure. The tree-type structure is hierarchical in nature and includes both parent folders and sub-folders or child folders, as described hereinafter with reference to FIG. 1.
FIG. 1 shows a conventional display 100 of a hierarchy of folders. The display 100 comprises a window of a Graphical User Interface (GUI), for example, provided by an operating system such as Microsoft® Windows®. However, the display 100 may be generated by a software application other than an operating system.
Referring to FIG. 1, folder1 is shown in the expanded state. Folder1 is a parent folder relative to sub-folder11 and sub-folder12. Folder1 may be shown in the contracted state by activation of the [−] icon adjacent to folder1.
Folder12 is also a parent folder, however, the sub-folder(s) of parent folder12 is/are not visible on account of folder12 being shown in the contracted state. The sub-folder(s) of folder12 may be shown in the expanded state by activation of the [+] icon adjacent to folder12. Folder11 is not a parent folder.
Folder2, folder3 and folder4 are parent folders shown in the contracted state.
Computer file systems generally provide a level of security by restricting permissions of individual users or groups of users in relation to folders. For example, certain users may be allowed to access certain folders (and files or items stored therein) but may be restricted from editing the folders' properties or the files or items stored therein, or creating new items in the folders. This is commonly known as “read-only” protection and denies a user “write” access.
In certain cases, a user may have “write” permission for a parent folder but may have restricted “read-only” permission for one or more sub-folder(s) of that parent folder. When a user wishes to store an item or file in a sub-folder some number of levels lower than the parent folder in the hierarchy, this may necessitate navigation through multiple levels of sub-folders only to discover (after performing the navigation) that the desired sub-folder is “read-only”. Moreover, all of the sub-folders in the navigation path may be “read-only”. In other words, if the user is intending to find a sub-folder to write to, the navigated path can be a “dead-end” on account of it being impossible to store the item in the desired sub-folder.
Referring again to FIG. 1, in order for a user to identify whether there are any sub-folders of any of folder2, folder3 and folder4 for which the user has “write” access, the user is required to actually navigate down the path by expanding the parent folders in the path. Navigating and expanding folders in this manner only to discover that the desired sub-folder is read-only, particularly on a repeated or continual basis, is a waste of time that would desirably be avoided.